Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger says he is ruling out running for the U.S. Senate against Barbara Boxer in 2010. The governor was asked about his post-Sacramento plans after a Field poll showed him with a 1 percentage point lead over Boxer in an imaginary Senate match-up.

Boxer's dip in popularity probably reflects the general unhappiness among California liberals with the failure of Congress to hold Bush and Cheney accountable for lying in the run-up to the Iraq occupation and their systematic shredding of both the U.S. Constitution and the Geneva Conventions, just for starters.

But Boxer has arguably done as much as she could to hold the Bushies accountable. And in her 2004 reelection bid she received the third highest number of votes of any candidate in the country, next to Bush and John Kerry, respectively. She will likely bounce back. (On the other hand, rebounding is less certain for our other senator, Dianne Feinstein, who outraged her constituents last week by voting to confirm Michael Mukasey as Bush's new attorney general, even after Mukasey indirectly acknowledged that he will continue to greenlight and give cover to Bush's torture policies. Feinstein is not up for reelection until 2012.)

Mainly, though, it's hard to imagine Arnold Schwarzenegger as just one of 100 big fish in the Senate pond.

Schwarzenegger also ruled out running for mayor of Los Angeles. This is a no-brainer. There is very little glory in being L.A.'s mayor. For one thing, the balance of power here tilts more toward the city council, and less toward the mayor, than in most big cities.

For another, despite the city's propensity for earthquakes, riots, and wildfires, no Los Angeles chief executive has ever been dubbed "America's Mayor" because he stayed on the job during a crisis. Unless there was a chance Arnold could become another America's Mayor, it is unlikely he'd be interested.

The U.S. command announced six new deaths Tuesday, making 2007 the bloodiest year for American troops in Iraq despite a recent decline in casualties and a sharp drop in roadside bombings. With nearly two months left in the year, the annual toll is now 853 --- three more than the previous worst of 850 in 2004.

Six U.S. troops were killed when insurgents ambushed their foot patrol in the high mountains of eastern Afghanistan, officials said Saturday. The attack, the most lethal against American forces this year, made 2007 the deadliest for U.S. troops in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion.

US President George W. Bush had a shoot-out with the "bad guys" in Iraq on Thursday, playing a computer game with war veterans that simulates a firefight in Baghdad, the White House said. Bush tried his hand at the game with two soldiers during a visit to a rehabilitation center in Texas that treats veterans wounded in Iraq... Apart from the computer game session, Bush's visit with badly wounded soldiers was often emotional as he spoke with patients who had lost limbs or suffered severe burns in the Iraq war.

Mark Cuban, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks, several television networks and, in fact, a blogger, is "very grateful" to Bill O'Reilly, the Fox "News" media personality who has been attacking --- and even threatening --- him mercilessly, of late.

After first replying that O'Reilly's attacks didn't much matter, and that they had very little effect either way, I followed up to ask specifically about Brian DePalma's upcoming film, Redacted, which Cuban's network, HDNet is releasing shortly.

"When it comes to a specific project like Redacted," Cuban responded, "which is a small movie, it's grown bigger and bigger by the day. So I'm very grateful to him."

"Bill O'Reilly is my new best friend," he added, to laughter from the crowd which was made up of bloggers and industry-related folks of all political stripes.

I'll try to get the audio or video posted on that point later if I can, as an update. As the room is filled with several thousand bloggers, I suspect it should be easy to find shortly. (If anybody beats me to it, feel free to link it in comments, as I'll be off grid for the next several hours!)

P.S. As his address was in the same room where I had just finished up my final panel of the conference, I had the opportunity to chat with him quickly as we were trading places on the stage, and was able to thank him for HDNet's breathtaking Dan Rather Reportsinvestigative exposé on touch-screen voting technology. I encouraged him to keep going along those lines and support Rather's work in this regard. He agreed that it was an amazing report, and in turn, he thanked me for The BRAD BLOG's coverage of same.

So he's a billionaire who pays attention.

The most understated bio I've perhaps ever seen: On the big screens next to the podium where he was speaking, the title card read simply, "Mark Cuban, Blogger".

Until last night, the criminal responsibility for the torturing of terror suspects by the U.S. government was entirely on the heads of George Bush, Dick Cheney, their senior aides and the civilian and uniformed military leadership who approved and implemented "advanced interrogation techniques" such as waterboarding.

Late in the evening yesterday, however, the U.S. Senate, including all Republicans who were present, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CN) and six senior Democrats, willingly assumed responsibly for Bush's torture policies by rubberstamping his nominee, Michael Mukasey, to be the next U.S. attorney general.

Mukasey --- a crony of Rudy Giuliani, the Republican presidential candidate who, during his tenure as New York City mayor, revealed fascistic tendencies that are alarmingly similar to those of George Bush and Dick Cheney --- indicated during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee that he will continue to greenlight Bush's torture policies.

Now the question is, will Mukasey also assist Bush, Cheney and the rest in trying to avoid war-crimes charges after they leave office.

The six senior Democratic senators who voted to confirm Mukasey and thus condone torture were:

Sequoia has now been sold, yet again. This time the new owners are the present management team. Who is really behind the purchase and what was the final purchase price? Smartmatic paid $16M for the company which represented a $7M loss for its previous owner. Also, now that the Venezuelans are not involved who is going to do all of the ballot programming?

Is Cuyahoga Co Ohio too big for Diebold/Premier? That’s a question being asked by the media and probably some members of the county Board of Elections.

Poll workers failed to remove the results cartridges from seven Sequoia Advantage machines in Camden Co New Jersey. If the votes on those cartridges won’t affect any races the votes won’t be considered in the final tally, according to state law. Election officials wonder why voter turn-out is so low. That’s one reason.

Counting of ballots in Lackawanna Co Pennsylvania was much slower than expected either with or because of Premier/Diebold employees running the optical-scan machines. Was the hold-up a ploy to make optical-scan systems look bad and to sell the county DREs?

Lawrence Co Ohio reports that votes have been flipped due to a software error by ES&S.

The Senate today voted overwhelmingly to override President Bush's veto of a popular $23-billion water bill, marking the first override of a Bush veto.

The bipartisan, 79-14 vote, following a House vote earlier in the week to override the veto, means the bill authorizing water projects becomes law over the president's objections.

Thirty-four Republicans joined 43 Democrats and two independents in rejecting Bush's assertion that the bill was fiscally irresponsible and voting for the override --- a reflection of their determination to preserve politically important projects for their states. Twelve Republicans and two Democrats voted no.

My colleague Trish at Pensito Review suggested earlier this week that this veto override could signal a change in the wind for Bush's political fortunes:

I’m betting that once it gets started, Congress will keep right on ripping... I think Bush miscalculated. He’s teasing the dog that’s always been tied to the tree one too many times. When the rope breaks and Congress gets a taste of blood --- remembering what it feels like to be an equal participant in the governing process --- who knows where it will stop?

The Education Department's inspector general [IG] says he will review whether federal money is inappropriately being spent on programs by a company founded by Neil Bush, the president's brother.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington [CREW], a Washington-based watchdog group, called for the inquiry and released a letter this week from the department's inspector general, John Higgins Jr.

In it, Higgins said he would ask an assistant to examine the group's complaint.

CREW contends that the educational programs distributed by Ignite!, Neil Bush's company, are worthless, and that school districts who spend federal dollars on the programs are wasting taxpayers' money.

Ignite! president Ken Leonard said that that his company had not been contacted by anyone from the Education Dept. about the matter:

"Ignite! Learning has no knowledge of any customer that has procured our curriculum solutions through means which are other than completely ethical and in compliance with the typical guidelines of their various funding sources," Leonard said.

The program in question is "Curriculum on Wheels," which includes software for teaching math, social studies and science. Each program costs $3,800 each, not including subscription fees, according to the Associated Press.

Late last night I posted a sampling of some of the early problem reports coming in from Tuesday's election and noted that, as has been the pattern we've noticed, the early reports from the media, on the day of any election, tend to downplay problems with voting systems. That, in no small part, is because the media rely, at first, on information from Election Officials who have a vested interest in downplaying any problems as little more than a "glitch" here or there.

I also noted the breadth of actual Election Day problems with voting systems tend to come a day or so (or even longer) thereafter.

Based on John Gideon's "Daily Voting News" roundup tonight, I'd say the assessment was spot on. If nothing else, please just click that link, and browse down the headlines he has listed tonight, covering stories across the country on problems that occurred Tuesday.

And then remind yourself that this was an off-year election, with very low turnout in most places around the country. What could possibly go wrong when the real voting begins in early 2008 and beyond?

What the hell are we thinking?

(NOTE: I may be off-grid for much of the next day or two at least. So watch for brilliant Guest Bloggers to swoop in and take my place in driving you mad.)

This is a typical post-election day DVN. Lot’s of reports of failures and problems. Part of the problem with today’s technical elections is that they are “high tech” and probably too “high.” Voters don’t understand it all and election workers don’t understand even when they are supposed to have been trained. Most Election officials clearly don’t understand what is happening so they blindly take the word of the vendors. The single county with the most problems last year seems to have repeated its poor record. Marion Co (Indianapolis) Indiana has a real problem with elections administration and the machines. Atlantic Co New Jersey had machine problems and they are still not sure what happened though Sequoia did what they do well and immediately pointed the finger at the county as being the problem. Cuyahoga Co Ohio had far fewer problems than in the past but there is still an unexplained problem with their voting system. And Denver Colorado had to call in the Police Dept and SWAT members to help count a late deluge of mail-in ballots.

Also of extreme importance today is the DoJ decision to step in and attempt to usurp New York State’s right to select a voting system that meets their standards.

And late today the city of San Francisco announced that they are filing a breach of contract lawsuit against ES&S.

Tomorrow’s DVN will be sent earlier in the day due to your correspondent flying out to DC to attend a conference. DVN will go on hiatus for the weekend to be started up again on Tuesday.

But for today, all of the above stories, and the rest of today's notable voting news, are linked below...

As reported in full by David Swanson, in the wake of yesterday's wild ride (and game of chicken) on the House floor concerning the privileged resolution filed by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), calling for the Impeachment of Dick Cheney.

The following is from a letter sent to constituents today by Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL), a member of the House Judiciary Committee, where the matter has been sent again. Wexler is calling for the committee "to schedule impeachment hearings immediately and not let this issue languish as it has over the last six months."...

I share your belief that Vice President Cheney must answer for his deceptive actions in office, particularly with regard to the preparations for the Iraq war and the revelation of the identity of covert agent Valerie Plame Wilson as part of political retribution against her husband. That is why I voted against the motion to table debate on H.Res. 333. Along with only 85 other Democrats, I opposed tabling the measure and supported beginning immediate debate and a vote on the Cheney impeachment resolution. The vote on tabling the Kucinich resolution was rejected, and the House subsequently voted to refer the matter to the Judiciary Committee.
...
The American people are served well with a legitimate and thorough impeachment inquiry. I will urge the Judiciary Committee to schedule impeachment hearings immediately and not let this issue languish as it has over the last six months. Only through hearings can we bring begin to correct the abuses of Dick Cheney and the Bush Administration; and, if it is determined in these hearings that Vice President Cheney has committed High Crimes and Misdemeanors, he should be impeached and removed from office.

We've come a long way, baby. I guess. The world o' blogging, I mean. At least since I was accidentally sucked into the vortex back in early 2004.

Apparently, we now even rate our own "trade show," as the very first "Blog World & New Media Expo" is scheduled for this week at the Convention Center in Las Vegas, where I've been invited to speak.

So what do we have to trade exactly? I'm not entirely sure, but I suppose I'll find out this Thursday and Friday, when I'll likely be trading barbs, at least, on several panels in the show's "Political Track," along with such exemplary wingnuts as Hugh Hewitt, John Hindraker, and oh, so many more that the cat will no doubt be dragging in.

On the other hand, I'm happily looking forward to meeting many of the fine not-wingnut bloggers out there that I've known as little more than email addresses for many years. This from BlogWorld's blog item by the expo's director, Rick Calvert...

Now I know what you are thinking. You normally wouldn't find half of these folks hanging out with the other half and that is exactly what makes it such a great line up! One thing they can all agree on is blogging beats the MSM any day of the week.

Register Now and join us for some some great discussion, some great debate and a few fireworks.

Panels I'll be participating in (if I can get there in time) and at which I hope you'll stop by if interested:

Voter turnout was light in many parts of the country yesterday. Ironically enough, that's the good news.

Alternet ran a preview of voter suppression issues of concern in yesterday's elections across the country. Sure enough, the author, Steve Rosenfeld, wrote in during the early evening to let us know there were problems concerning Photo ID issues popping up in pockets around the country, and that he'd have more soon. Our own Alan Breslauer touched base as well with several reports he'd been getting from around the country.

John Gideon's "Daily Voting News" yesterday pointed to some of those issues that had been reported in the media as of yesterday afternoon around the country. GOP voter suppression, through specious claims of Democratic "voter fraud" and the invented "need," therefore, for disenfranchising photo ID laws and challenges at the polls, is at the top of the Republican strategy for '08. Naturally, it was taken out for a test spin yesterday.

(Speaking of spin, don't miss wingnut Mychal Massie's despicable retread diatribe --- including the mandatory quotes from GOP "voter fraud" fraudster, John Fund, who wrote the book on it, literally --- in the wingnut WorldNetDaily. His tragically misguided piece, headlined "Vote fraud: Democrats' meal ticket" gives you just about all you need to know. Read it once, save yourself a thousand or so near-identical reads between now and November 2008. But we digress...)

The other major prong of voter disenfranchisment is, of course, the machine issue. Problems in that area, in particular, tend to reveal themselves in the days after elections. Early on election day such problems are frequently downplayed in the media, who tend to turn to Election Officials for information despite the inherent conflict of interest such officials have in hoping to portray their elections as "successful."

In the early hours, then, hints of such breakdowns are reported as little more than computer "glitches" "hiccups" "snafus" and "snags" (though "kinks" makes it debut today, see below) until later on, when the true extent of the voting system failures --- and that's what they are, not "kinks" --- become known.

With that in mind, here are just a few of those e-voting glitches, hiccups, snafus, snags, and yes, kinks, from around the country so far yesterday, as culled from Gideon's DVN last night...

Today seems to be a typical odd-year election day so far. Problems are reported throughout the nation. Of course no reasons are given for problems except in a few occasions the errors are “human error”; they are never the machines' fault or the vendors' fault. Marion Co Indiana has been the “poster child” for failed elections and it seems that this election is no different. Also today the DoJ has stepped in and suggested to the courts that New York needs to have help in selecting a new voting system and they need to have that system by next year’s elections. ...